Dr. James Emery White

This weekend is known as Palm Sunday weekend. So what? It’s a fair question. In our culture, the significance of sacred days and times has long been forgotten. We live our lives on the surface of frenetic activity, seldom adding depth to any given moment. We surf and skim over a body of information, but rarely dive into the depths of knowledge, much less wisdom.

One of the most frequent questions I get from fellow pastors has to do with hiring (and firing) staff. As in how do you know who to hire? When do you know it’s time to let someone go? How do you evaluate current staff in terms of future roles and responsibilities – or even if there is a future?

A judge ruled that a Washington state florist who refused to provide a flower arrangement for a gay wedding “because of [her] relationship with Jesus” violated the state’s anti-discrimination and consumer protection laws. To say that belief cannot be linked with action is to say that religion is fine as long as it isn’t real.

This past week, a high-profile White House meeting with the title “Countering Violent Extremism” went out of its way to avoid labeling acts of brutal violence by Al Qaeda, ISIS (the so-called Islamic State), and their allies as “Muslim” terrorism or describing their ideology as “Islamic” or “jihadist.”

Rob Bell, former pastor and now host of the “Rob Bell Show” on Oprah Winfrey’s OWN television network, is now maintaining that a church that doesn’t support same-sex marriage is irrelevant. Sometimes I don’t know where to begin. But I’ll give it a try.